


Never Miss You Again

by cymyguy



Series: Volleygirls prompts [2]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/F, Getting Back Together, Hinata POV, Love Confessions, Post-Break Up, Professional athletes, Secrets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-26
Updated: 2019-08-26
Packaged: 2020-09-27 07:53:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20404252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cymyguy/pseuds/cymyguy
Summary: Two years to find a way as an individual, to learn to do it herself, to learn to not, but she’s still standing here with the same team, the same bag on her shoulder, waiting under the same city sky for a bus in the morning, and she’s still missing Kageyama.





	Never Miss You Again

**Author's Note:**

> prompt: secrets

Shouyou thought college would be the best. They’d dated for almost all of it, gotten their own apartment their fourth year, won three national championships, and graduated. But then, there was the year after graduation, when they’d dated, gotten a new apartment, and made Japan’s _national_ _team_. And they’d won a bronze medal in the freaking Olympics. So this year would now have to be considered the best. But then, Shouyou thought about it a little harder, about how high school had led to college, and college to the Olympic year, and she decided she should just stop labeling any period of time as the definitive best. Because with Kageyama, her setter, best friend, and girlfriend, she was only going to keep going up.

After the Olympics, they were both picked up by a league team. Only, they were picked up by two different teams, in two different cities. Kageyama’s team wanted her for their setter, but they didn’t need another spiker. Shouyou’s team needed a spiker, but not a setter. So they would have to separate, there was no other way to keep up with their dreams. But the past gave Shouyou complete faith in the future, and she fully believed they were about to be their new best ever.

Then, a week before they were going to officially move out and take their things to opposite sides of the country, Kageyama sat her down on their couch and talked to her. The things she said were sensible and mature, and everything in them told Shouyou how much this woman cared for her, how much she put into being her partner, how carefully she considered everything to do with Shouyou so that she could always be sure she was set up to be the best she could possibly be. It would’ve made Shouyou fall in love with her all over again, except the end result of the talk was an agreement to break up, amicably, to separate physically and actually separate. They did it because it would be better for them as individuals.

But Shouyou had been forced to start questioning this, when for the first time in her whole life she felt like the times weren’t going from best to better, but best to a little bit less than.

She’d missed Kageyama right away, but not the way she misses her now. She doesn’t like talking to her through messages, and in the guarded way they do now. She doesn’t like only seeing her when their teams play, or growing apart from her parents who she was always so fond of, or going to friends’ weddings with no date, and no prospects of her own.

And she doesn’t like waiting for the online post that will finally show Kageyama’s change of status, that will confirm her new commitment to someone who helped her with physical therapy, or someone that she met because they cover the sports section of her local newspaper, or even someone who spikes her tosses, currently.

They’ve been apart for two years, after dating for almost five. Shouyou wishes these were not the thoughts she was lying awake with in the early hours of the morning, in a shared hotel room the day after the Japan league tournament conclusion. But it’s Kageyama’s fault.

Yesterday their teams met in the final. Each of the five sets was decided by 2 points, and Kageyama had edged her out in the final one, a marathon set that went almost double its minimum score, a truly grueling 29-27 loss. Afterwards, right afterwards, almost before any celebration with her team, Kageyama had ducked under the net and given Shouyou a hug. It was the old kind of hug, the kind they’d used to share before they started dating, but it was great.

It was also yesterday. And two years ago. And seven years ago. Shouyou gets out of bed, with a little shake of her head, and sets out to pack her bag exceptionally well, much better than she usually does. By then, the rest of the team will be up and moving, getting ready for the bus home.

She wishes she could have won, and yes, she’s frustrated as all hell. But she’s also never been more invigorated, by a loss. She’s still feeling the excitement, the nerves gnawing away during every single point of that last set, in little tingles over her skin and a soft, comforting kind of buzz in her head. And her mind is running in hyperdrive, like it always does when volleyball reminds her with such clarity that she is living. Living, working, making new friends, keeping old ones. Moving to new places, and making them your home. Sharing what you have with others. Starting a family of your own. Pursuing, with someone beside you. Pursuing together. That’s what she and Kageyama had been doing. It’s what she had, and what she’s missing now. Two years to find a way as an individual, to learn to do it herself, to learn to _not_, but she’s still standing here with the same team, the same bag on her shoulder, waiting under the same city sky for a bus in the morning, and she’s _still _missing Kageyama.

And it’s just now, that she sees her again.

Kageyama is down the street, waiting beside her own bus. Their hotels were right next to each other this whole week, and Shouyou didn’t notice until now. She watches Kageyama lift her foot to the first step, and disappear into the bus, but she doesn’t stop seeing her in her mind’s eye. It’s like a moment out on the court. She sees the ball, and she’s not going to let it get away from her, not without fighting with everything she has. She’s not going to let Kageyama get away from her.

Hinata charges down the sidewalk, discarding her duffle bag at the halfway point. She runs to the door where Kageyama disappeared, and leaps all three steps at once, landing in the front of the bus.

“Kageyama Tobio!”

She scans over face after face, until she finds it. The bluest eyes, the prettiest lashes, the familiar fringe, and a mouth gaping just the smallest bit at her.

“I—”

Shouyou looks into the eyes she knows everything about. The eyes that have poured tears for only her to see. The eyes that have promised her a hundred things and made good on them all. The eyes that have shone at her like she’s the only thing they’ll ever need to see.

“I still love you,” she declares, “And I wish I would’ve asked you to marry me before I lost you!”

She looks at her for several long seconds; then Kageyama’s shock registers with her, and she looks around the bus at everyone else who’s staring.

“Um—” She clears her throat. “Anyway—I have to get on my bus.” She glances at the other players. “Congratulations on your victory.”

Shouyou bows, steps around a coach with a nod and an apology, and jumps back onto the sidewalk.

She jogs toward her own bus, scooping up her bag as she goes. That jacked her way up; she feels like she could play another tournament, right here and now. She’s probably going to collapse under the weight of dejection and hopelessness the minute she gets home, but—

“Hinata! Dumbass!”

Shouyou’s shoes screech against the sidewalk as she stops and turns around, chest still heaving with adrenaline. Kageyama is _right _in front of her. Shouyou staggers back. She shrinks as the tall woman bears down on her.

“You think you can just run away, after you did that to me in front of my whole team?” Kageyama says, in a low and frighteningly flat voice.

“I, uh—” She swallows. “Sorry I just—I just wanted to—before the buses left—”

Tobio reaches down, puts her arms around her, and lifts her into a hug. Shouyou stays very still for half a second. Then she blinks, and wraps her arms and legs around her best friend like she always used to. Tobio presses her face into her neck, and speaks against her skin.

“Why did we break up?”

Shouyou blinks again, swallows hard.

“Because—It was better for us as individuals.”

“Did you really think that?”

“Huh?”

“Or did you just believe it because I told you?” Tobio says.

Shouyou is quiet. Tobio loosens her arms around her until they can see each other. Shouyou wants to smile so big, having her this close again, but Tobio’s eyes are so steady and grave. Shouyou puts one hand against her neck, and uses the other to tuck the loose pieces of hair behind her ear. Tobio’s lips move.

“I did think it would be better. We were together so long, playing and—and doing everything, so I thought maybe—there were things we weren’t learning, or things we should’ve been doing for ourselves that we always relied on each other too much for, and that we were maybe keeping each other back somehow but we didn’t know—”

“I know,” Shouyou says, holding her face in both hands now. “You already explained. And I don’t forget things you say.”

Tobio presses their foreheads together.

“But I was mostly thinking about volleyball,” she says. “If you were thinking about—If you wanted to—to stay together, you should’ve said that. And I would’ve stayed together. I wanted to stay together.”

Shouyou pulls her in tighter.

“Well, I said it now…That—That counts. Right?”

She drinks from her eyes like a victim of the desert, until Tobio drops them down to her mouth. Shouyou gapes in surprise. Then Tobio presses her lips over hers. It’s warm like the covers of the bed they shared, and as familiar as the motion of Tobio’s toss, and Shouyou’s connecting swing. Shouyou’s head tilts on its own as she pulls Tobio in harder. Her nose squishes against her cheek, and Tobio gathers back her beautiful wonderful lips to renew the kiss, and Shouyou loves her, every errant toss and fumbled compliment and messy ponytail, and all the perfect ones too. They pull back and both suck in a breath.

A shout makes them flinch, and turn their heads, as the windows on Shouyou’s bus come slamming down and her team cheers out for them. The same noise bursts from down the street, as Tobio’s team cheers too. They look back at each other, flushing furiously. Shouyou ventures half a grin.

“It better be a really nice wedding,” Tobio growls, cheeks dark with blush.

Shouyou looks down, fingers fiddling with Tobio’s ponytail in the back. “So, are we engaged now?”

When she lifts her eyes, her partner flushes darker still. Shouyou cups her hands against her cheeks.

“We shouldn’t not tell each other important stuff anymore,” she says. Tobio shakes her head.

“You’re a dumbass,” she says, starting to smile.

“But, you want to marry me?”

She nods. Then she brings a hand up, pressing it to her neck. “I never want to miss you again.”


End file.
